India needs to adopt a multi-pronged approach to become self-reliant in chemicals. Industry leaders believe that setting up new chemical clusters, exploring export possibilities, ease of doing business; policy support and fast approval of projects are some of the critical issues that need to be addressed. At a recently organised e-Conference of Indian Chemical News, Shohab Rais, COO - Indian Chemical Business, Tata Chemicals highlighted these issues. “There is a need to set up new chemical clusters with a single window support mechanism. It is very important to form clusters where at least one or two large industry players are there along with many MSME units. The cluster should be developed in a way where larger units might have their own independent systems but for MSME units there should have a common effluent system, common utility support etc. These MSME units together, can complement each other and the larger units as vendor / customer,” Rais said. 

Emphasising more on single window support, Rais said that it is important to get into a system where industry submits one application and there is just one Experts Committee to give the clearances. “In case, if there are any internal processes required for this application or these experts to take opinions and need more time then there could be automated workflow systems which could internally flows as a unit and industry gets one final response from the regulators,” he opined. 

Another important aspect he touched upon is the continuous supply of energy. “if we are able to develop a network of gas, across the country either through PSUs or private players, there will be a continuous supply of energy to all those units at cost effective way so that efficiency and carbon intensity of operations can go up,” he added. 

Rais also talked about exploring the export opportunities being very critical for making Indian chemical industry self-reliant. He suggested that there is a need to put a dedicated body in place that can study  all available FTAs, capacities needed to be built up  to take the benefit of existing FTAs  and in parallel look at where the Chinese exports are happening. 

“So there is a possibility of Chinese exports to other countries getting reduced. If somebody tries to put these 2-3 things together and use data analytics and come out with ideas which will support the industries, I think that also would be one of the great things in time to develop ‘Aatma Nirbhar Bharat’, Rais suggested and added that a very important point is circular economy like one unit’s waste could be a raw material for another unit resulting in cost efficiencies and helping in creating a greener environment. 

He also suggested that industry should also try and understand key values, apart from the pricing, that importers might be seeking from exporters where imports are happening from different countries. “Whether it is customisation, quality parameters, service levels, supply assurance or the hedging towards their export commitment. We need to build these value propositions into our products and services so that instead being importers, we supply and become exporters. Gradually, we should try and ensure that how the reliance on  imports get reduced in the domestic market and how we are able to increase our capacity utilization, expand our capacities to increase supply position,” he said and added that industry should also try and see how we are able to leverage the research space very effectively. 

“We have a strong research base provided by the government, if you look at CSIR which is under the Ministry of Science and Technology there are more than 1400 IPRs and they have about 37 affiliated research laboratories. We could see as to how we leverage this and try to come out with IPRs, products and processes which will give better value than the products that are being imported? These will help us in our ‘Aatma Nirbhar’ journey,” he opined. 

Replying to a question on the short-term strategy to make the industry self-reliant, Rais suggested that the government should review all trade cases and clear it within one/two months rather than taking longer time. Secondly, wherever there are proposals of investments the government can form a committee and give clearance if everything is in the order. He suggested scaling up all the operating rates and competing with imports wherever possible in the short-term.

“On long-term basis, the government should help industries become ‘Atma Nirbhar’ by building scale. Government should allow everybody to build scale wherever possible for big industries through MSMEs and start-ups. All the processes for land lease, land acquisitions and environment clearances should be streamlined and should be made very smooth. Why should it take about 2 to 3 years for an environmental clearance? So, I think that is one long-term basis the government can do,” he said.

From an industry perspective, I feel on a long-term basis what we can look at is how do we bring more and more IPs? How do we innovate new products, and how do we scale up, he said.